


Digging Your Own Grave

by Airene



Category: Cobra Kai (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Coda, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s01e3 Esqueleto, He’s trying his best, Johnny that is, Light Angst, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Mild Language, Season/Series 01, Sucker for these two
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-10-07
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:06:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26877139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Airene/pseuds/Airene
Summary: "Jesus Christ, kid."Johnny hisses the words quietly between thin lips and a clenched jaw as he stands over the young boy, his muscles tensing beneath his flannel and fists clenching at his sides.What the hell did they do to you?A short work based off of how I envisioned Johnny to have reacted after the scene ended in the show.
Relationships: Miguel Diaz & Johnny Lawrence
Comments: 16
Kudos: 61





	Digging Your Own Grave

**Author's Note:**

> Really short, couldn’t help myself! I’m sorry if Johnny or Miguel acts too OOC, I tried to keep them in character, but I can get carried away. Please enjoy!

"Jesus Christ, kid."

Johnny hisses the words quietly between thin lips and a clenched jaw as he stands over the young boy, his muscles tensing beneath his flannel and fists clenching at his sides. 

_What the hell did they do to you?_

Breathing deeply through his nose, his nostrils flare as he barely restrains from stepping after the cackling punks who'd just exited the locker room; _Cool it, cool it, remember the kid._

But, it's tough. 

It's tough to swallow down the sight before him, the shattered form of the ridiculously pumped and cheery boy who'd latched himself onto Johnny from the moment he'd first seen him. He doesn't want to face it, doesn't want to go closer to view the bruised and bloodied face of a kid who should've never been touched in the first place. He was a stupid nerd who didn't know when to stop talking, yeah, but Johnny couldn't help the thread of odd affection he'd begun to consider the boy with as their number of encounters had increased.

And he'd failed him.

A hoarse and gurgled sound dangerously close to that of a whimper registers in Johnny's head and just like that, his frozen stance is breaking as he stumbles forward and into a crouched, hovering position over Miguel.

 _Not the time to get caught up in your head just yet, jackass,_ Johnny bitterly reminds himself as he assesses the boy's damage.

"Shit, those punks really fucking did a number on you, kid," He says with a grimace as he takes in the swollen, purpled and stained face of the teenager. For a moment, Johnny's heart beat speeds up as he can't differentiate the paint from Miguel's costume and his blood before he swallows roughly and forces himself to calm down. 

Just as Johnny's hesitantly reaching out, belatedly realizing with a start just how small and tiny the teenager is in comparison to his own larger and calloused hands and wondering whether his touch alone will hurt Miguel more than help, there's a cracked whisper that feels more like a shout in the quiet locker room.

"S- Sensei?"

Immediately, Johnny's gaze flickers from where he'd been looking over the boy's ribs to his face and he barely stops himself from recoiling backward as he registers the fact that the kid still had the stupid awareness to call him 'Sensei' in that moment before he's meeting the glazed-over eyes of a just barely conscious Miguel.

Suddenly, the weight of his failure is stooping Johnny's figure once again and any words Johnny had opened his mouth to say in that one moment are caught in his throat as he blinks down at the boy.

"Sensei Lawrence..." 

The edges of the older man's mouth are twitching as he forces a weak half-grin at Miguel's whispered words and distantly, Johnny makes a note to check on the boys' ribs for certain to make sure they hadn't broken any that might have caused the boy's croaked voice.

"Yeah, kid, it's me. Hey, look, how- How bad did they do you in? Break any bones? I need to know if- If I need to take you to the hospital-"

"S-Sensei, I— I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, Sensei L-Lawrence..."

The broken sob that rips out of the teenager hits Johnny in the gut like a well-aimed kick and he sucks in a hitched breath as any effort to save face and distance himself from the hurting boy beneath him crumbles with every lurched sob out of Miguel's mouth.

"I- I wasn't- Strong enough- I couldn't- I tried- I really tried, I'm- I'm so sorry, Sensei- I couldn't be str-"

The kid's voice is muffled and wet, tripping over each apology as his face glistens with tears and every word is like another fucking crack of the whip to Johnny because the kid shouldn't be crying to him let alone sobbing out those damn apologies like Johnny's deserving of them.

_Well, maybe if he wasn't such a pussy, he would've been able to take those guys on no fucking problem, huh?_

But even as the thought is flashing across his mind, Johnny can't control the way his face twists in self-disgust as he mentally beats down on himself.

_Yeah, and who's fucking fault is that exactly?_

_Mine, it's my fault,_ and Johnny takes a second to breath through his nose and close his eyes to try and clear his now blaringly loud head. 

_Focus, dumbass, focus._

"-and than I- I c-couldn't stop t-them, they had a- God, and it hurt, it _hurt_ so bad, I'm so s-"

And, well, Johnny decides that that's enough of fucking _that_ , as he finally forces himself to speak and he cuts off the boy's rambling before it breaks him in any further.

"Shut up, Miguel. You- You didn't fail me, alright? I- I get it, I get it, you didn't do anything wrong, okay? This isn't on you."

And the kid fucking looks up at him, red-rimmed eyes wide and shiny like every single word that's coming out of Johnny's mouth is goddamn biblical. It soothes and stabs at the older man's chest all at once, and he's coughing gruffly to hide the weight settled on his chest from the boy's gaze as he reaches out to slip his arms as gently as he can underneath the boy to heave him into his arms.

"I- I c'n walk...Sensei-"

"Yeah fucking right, kid. I'm sure you can."

He snaps at Miguel as he secures the feeble teenager in his arms and immediately regrets it as the boy's entire body jerks with the flinch he releases upon hearing Johnny's sharp tone and clipped words.

And in that moment, it's so fucking wrong, all of it- Miguel should be in the arms of someone else, a friend, or even teacher, anybody _but_ the asshole-of—a-Sensei whose hold is naturally rough and hard from years of training and who can't even fucking help protect his _one_ student— 

And it's been so long since he's been anything close to tender, but as Johnny's train of self-loathing is cut off by the tightening hold that Miguel has on the older man's flannel, one arm squished between his own body and Johnny's and the other loosely gripping onto the fabric of his shirt as well, Johnny feels the closest he has to that foreign feeling as he readjusts Miguel in his arms.

His eyes are stinging as his throat closes up, a soft "Yeah-" escaping him before he starts up toward his car, the weight of his failure burning his chest before settling against the balm of Miguel's hold on him.

**Author's Note:**

> If you can’t tell, I’m a softie for their relationship! As a result, a lot of the things I have written are very soft, so again, I’m sorry if this is OOC!
> 
> (I’m also very much _not_ a writer, haha, so I apologize if the writing is bad. I literally just wrote it out because I wanted to see it done! There’s not enough fics for this fandom.)


End file.
